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There have been countless headlines in the past few days about Donald Trump's "terrible week" as if the negative statements that he made about women and other targets of his ire were somehow ephemeral or transitory, rather than consistent with the way he has run his whole presidential campaign right from the beginning, from his first speech bashing Mexican immigrants as "criminals" and "rapists".

Despite a series of highly offensive statements toward various racial and religious minorities, as well as based on gender, not only this past week, but during the past 15 months or so if not long before he started running for president, that would have destroyed any other candidate a long time ago, Trump's campaign has not only survived but is still very much in the running for president, trailing a less than universally popular Hillary Clinton by only a very few points.

It is hard to imagine that most voters are unaware of Trump's positions on the issues, his statements, or character. This can only mean that there is a deep vein of racial intolerance and authoritarianism in this country which Trump has tapped into with a great deal of success so far.

Accordingly, America, with its ideals of democracy and racial equality, is still in very great danger.

Here is a good headline to start the day with: in the Huffington Post, dated September 3. It is called:
"The Fascist is a Fraud"

Anyone who might be wondering whom the above story might just possibly be referring to can go to the Huffpost's website for further details. I am not posting the link here, because HuffingtonPost's URL's are so complex that typing one in would take all day.

As this is written, the Kaine-Pence Vice-Presidential debate is coming to a close..

While these candidates are both making at least some sort of serious attempts to discuss actual issues facing the American people, here is Donald Trump's comment on the debate, tweeted about a half hour after it began:

"Kaine looks like an evil crook out of the Batman movies."

Just another example of the same high level of discussion that Trump's campaign has been on right from the start - one based on insults over issues.

Where is Trump's respect for the intelligence and good judgment of the American people?

One could say that Trump's campaign is being run on a third grade level, but that would not be fair to third graders. They do not have anywhere near the intense, concentrated hatred and venom which exudes from almost every comment Trump has made during his entire presidential campaign.

If this degree of intense hate toward immigrants, toward Muslims, toward women, African-Americans and just about anyone who opposes him on any issue is combined with the enormous power of the presidency, can any reasonable person expect our democracy to survive for very much longer?

Who told the truth about Donald Trump's own statements and proposals on immigration, taxes, foreign dictators, women and many other issues at Tuesday night's Vice Presidential debate? Kaine, or Pence?

Kaine did, while Pence avoided, distorted or lied about his own running mate's positions. Anyone who doubts this can just read the debate transcript, or a good summary in the October 5 Huffington Post: Liar, Liar, Pence on Fire.

As for Nolan's comment, he is entirely correct in pointing out that I am not a Donald Trump supporter. That is one statement that I will certainly not disagree with Nolan about.

One of the many reasons that I do not support Trump is that he has a very tenuous relationship with the truth on immigration and a great variety of other issues, as Immigration Daily pointed out itself in its recent editorial Liar Trump.

If Nolan can show that a single one of the false statements, especially about immigration, that Immigration Daily attributed to Trump in its above editorial was in fact true, or that Trump did not make such statement(s), Nolan is welcome to do so.

In the same way, as Huffpost (which Nolan also happens to be a contributor to - though this of course does not imply that he necessarily agrees with them on any particular issue) has fact checked Pence about his defense of Donald Trump during the V.P. debate, and shown quite a few misstatements by Pence on that score.

I am not going to list them all here because of time considerations. They are in the easily accessible Huffpost article I mention above.

Can Nolan show that the Huffington Post was wrong about any the misstatements it accused Pence of making?

To his credit, Pence did not rant and rave during the VP debate and did not spew out vicious and offensive comments about his opponents or about racial or religious minorities the way Trump does effortlessly, without even thinking, almost every time he opens his mouth. To the contrary, Pence came over as far more calm and focused than his boss.

That does not mean that everything Pence said about Trump's statements was truthful, whether in his attempt to deny that Trump made bigoted comments about Mexican immigrants to open his campaign, or whether in denying that Trump proposed a deportation "task force", to mention only two instances.

Pence may or may not have shown himself to be a better debater than Kaine. But Pence definitely was an infinitely better debater than Donald Trump.

In that regard, Donald Trump was the biggest loser of the vice-presidential debate contest.

Since this is the 21st century AD, not the 1st Century AD, we can assume that Pence will not suffer any retaliation from Donald Trump for showing Trump to be an inferior debater.

Pence will certainly be in a better position than was the brilliant young 1st Century AD Roman poet, Lucan, who had the temerity to beat the emperor Nero in a poetry contest and was later ordered by Nero to commit suicide when Lucan was only 25 years old (though, admittedly, for a different reason).

Even though I agree with the 50 distinguished Republican former national security officials, among many other respected and responsible Republicans who are planning to vote against Trump next month, and who believe that Trump is unfit to be president and would be a great danger to America and the world as president, my mentioning this historical anecdote does not mean that I am comparing Trump with that most infamous of all Roman emperors.

I have no intention of equating Donald Trump with one of the worst madmen in all human history, and my comments above should definitely not be taken in that sense.

Nolan also has another good point - I certainly do nor disagree with him about everything - when he points out above that no one is responding to my comments above.

I often wonder myself why no one reads my comments - that is, other than the more than 7,000 people who read my Immigration Daily blog comments about INA Section 212(f) last month.

Roger Algase
Attorney at Law

John Myers
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10-06-2016 03:39 PM

Frankly I am not interested in your editorial opinion about which of the presidential candidates is more truthful. Why don't you stick to news about immigration law. That's what practitioners who read your newsletter are interested in. John Myers

Mr Myers is cordially invited to join the more than 7,000 ID readers who have read my September Immigration Daily blog comment dealing with INA Section 212(f), which, the last time I checked, was still part of our immigration law.

Any comment he might wish to make on that or any of my other recent ID immigration law blog comments too numerous to mention would be welcome and warmly appreciated.

I would also respectfully disagree with anyone who argues that the veracity, adherence to democratic and constitutional principles of rule of law, freedom from racial/religious prejudice. and all round stability, or lack of any or all of the above, in any candidate for the highest office in our land, with the enormous power that that one single person would have over our immigration system under Section 212(f) and a host of other statutes and regulations, is irrelevant to a discussion of immigration law.

How can considerations of who would be be making and enforcing our immigration or any other laws be separated from an intelligent and full discussion of the actual laws themselves?

The abominable things that Donald Trump said about women 11 years ago, which, according to The Hill and many other news media, are causing consternation within Republican circles and may, arguably, be putting his presidential campaign on life support, see:

are, in fact, eclipsed by the even worse things that Trump has been saying about Mexican and Muslim immigrants during his presidential campaign which began some 16 months ago.

Certainly, it is difficult to deny the common elements of hate, whether calling women names that I cannot print on this site, or referring to most (legal as well as illegal) Mexican immigrants as "criminals" and "rapists", or most Muslim immigrants (and many US citizens) as "terrorists" who are "pouring" into this country and whose American c-religionists (or their places of worship) should be put under under surveillance.

There is a direct line from Trump's "horrific" and "sickening" comments about women (to mention terms that many Republican leaders, not only Democrats, are using about his 2005 comments), to his attempts to demonize and dehumanize minority immigrants now.

All one has to do is to connect the dots.

Therefore, it is understandable that there will be attempts to turn the spotlight away from Trump's horrendous and degrading comments about women (and immigrants) to the allegedly Russian-hacked materials about some of Hillary Clinton's speeches and emails, more of which have reportedly just been released. In answer to this attempt at diversion, there is an old Jewish expression: